Incomplete recovery
from grief can have a lifelong negative effect on your capacity
for happiness. Drawing from their own histories, as well as from
others, the authors illustrate what grief is and how it is possible
to recover and regain energy and spontaneity. Based on a proven
program, now extensively revised, The Grief Recovery Handbook offers
grievers the specific actions needed to complete the grieving process
and accept loss. For those ready to regain a sense of aliveness,
the principles outlined here make this a life-changing handbook.

"This book is required for all my classes. Themore I use
this book, the more I believe that unresolved grief is themajor
underlying issue in most people's lives. It is the only work
of itkind that I know of that outlines the problem and provides
thesolution."
-- Bernard McGrane, Ph.D., Professor of Sociology, ChapmanUniversity

Excerpt:Grief: A Neglected and Misunderstood Process

Grief is the normal and natural reaction to loss of any kind.
Therefore, the feelings you are having are also normal and natural
for you. The problem is that we have all been socialized to believe
that these feelings are abnormal and unnatural.

While grief is normal and natural, and clearly the most powerful
of all emotions, it is also the most neglected and misunderstood
experience, often by both the grievers and those around them.

Grief is the conflicting feelings caused by the end of or change
in a -familiar pattern of behavior. What do we mean by conflicting
feelings? Let us explain by example. When someone you love dies
after suffering a long illness, you may feel a sense of relief
that your loved one's suffering is over. That is a positive feeling,
even though it is associated with a death. At the same time, you
may realize that you can no longer see or touch that person. This
may be very painful for you. These conflicting feelings, relief
and pain, are totally normal in response to death.

What about divorce? Are there conflicting feelings too?
Yes. You may feel a genuine sense of freedom now that the battles
are over. That is a positive feeling. At the same time, you may
be afraid that you will never "find someone as beautiful/as good
a provider." These conflicting feelings, freedom and fear, are
also natural responses to loss.

All relationships have aspects of familiarity whether they are
romantic, social, familial, or business. What other losses cause
similar conflicting feelings? While death and divorce are obvious,
many other loss experiences have been identified that can produce
grief. Among them are:

Death of a petMoving
Starting school
Death of a former spouse
Marriage
Graduation
End of addictions
Major health changes
Retirement
Financial changes-positive or negative
Holidays
Legal problems
Empty nest

Often these common life experiences are not seen as grieving events.
We grieve for the loss of all relationships we deem significant
- which are thus also emotional.

If the major loss events in your life have not been associated
with death, do not put this book down.

After twenty years of working with grievers, we have identified
several other losses, including loss of trust, loss of safety,
and loss of control of one's body (physical or sexual abuse).
Society still does not recognize these losses as grief issues.

Loss-of-trust events are experienced by almost everyone and can
have a major, lifelong negative impact. You may have experienced
a loss of trust in a parent, a loss of trust in God, or a loss
of trust in any other relationship. Is loss of trust a grief issue?
The answer is yes. And the problem of dealing with the grief it
causes remains the same. Grief is normal and natural, but we have
been ill prepared to deal with it. Grief is about a broken heart,
not a broken brain. All efforts to heal the heart with the head
fail because the head is the wrong tool for the job. It's like
trying to paint with a hammer-it only makes a mess.

Almost all intellectual comments are preceded by the phrase, "Don't
feel bad." In 1977, when John's infant son died, a well-meaning
friend said, "Don't feel bad-you can have other children." The
intellectually accurate statement that John had the physical capability
to have other children was not only irrelevant, it was unintentionally
abusive, because it belittled his natural and normal emotions.
John felt bad, his heart was broken.

When Russell and his first wife divorced, he was devastated. A
friend said, "Don't feel bad-you'll do better next time." Most
of the comments that grievers hear following a loss, while intellectually
accurate, are emotionally barren. As a direct result of these
conflicting ideas, a griever often feels confused and frustrated,
feelings that lead to emotional isolation.

Since most of us have been socialized to attempt to resolve all
issues with our intellect, grief remains a huge problem. This
intellectual focus has even led to academic articles that suggest
gender is an issue in grief. We recognize that males and females
are socialized differently, but our experience indicates that
males and females are similarly limited when it comes to dealing
with sad, painful, and negative feelings. Feelings themselves
are without gender. There is no such thing as girl sad or boy
sad, girl happy or boy happy.

We are not saying that intellect is totally useless in regard
to grief. In fairness, you are reading a book, which is an intellectual
activity. The book will ask you to understand concepts and to
take actions, so clearly there is a degree of intellect involved.

Grief and Recovery

For many, seeing this book's title is the first time they have
ever seen the terms "grief' and "recovery" used together. Religious
and spiritual leaders have pointed out for centuries that we should
look at loss as an opportunity for personal spiritual development.
Yet in modern life, moving through intense emotional pain has
become such a misunderstood process that most of us have very
little idea of how to respond to loss.

What do we mean by recovery? Recovery means feeling better. Recovery
means claiming your circumstances instead of your circumstances
claiming you and your happiness. Recovery is finding new meaning
for living, without the fear of being hurt again. Recovery is
being able to enjoy fond memories without having them precipitate
painful feelings of regret or remorse. Recovery is acknowledging
that it is perfectly all right to feel sad from time to time and
to talk about those feelings no matter how those around you react.
Recovery is being able to forgive others when they say or do things
that you know are based on their lack of knowledge about grief.
Recovery is one day realizing that your ability to talk about
the loss you've experienced is indeed normal and healthy...

From Grief Recovery Handbook by John W. James and Russell Friedman.
HarperCollins Publishers. Used by permission.

John
W. James was
born in Danville, Illinois. He was thrust unwillingly into the arena
of grief and recovery when his three-day-old son died in 1977. John
lives in Los Angeles with his Emmy Award-winning wife, Jess Walton
-- the evil "Jill Abbott" on The Young & the Restless
-- and spends most of his free time with daughter Allison and son
Cole.

Russell P.
Friedman
was born in Port Chester, New York. He arrived at the Grief Recovery
Institute in 1986, following a second divorce and a major financial
disaster. He started as a volunteer, and stayed and stayed and stayed.
The apple of his eye, daughter Kelly, lives in San Francisco. Russell
lives in Sherman Oaks with Alice Borden and their dog, Max.